


Powder Black and White

by lferion



Category: The Nancy - Stan Rogers (Song)
Genre: Black Powder, Boats and Ships, Drabble Sequence, Hair-powder, M/M, Yuletide, Yuletide 2017, Yuletide Madness Drabble Invitational
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-26
Updated: 2017-12-26
Packaged: 2019-02-22 00:09:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13154979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lferion/pseuds/lferion
Summary: What clothes men wear do give them airs, the fellows do compare.A colonel's regimentals shine, and women call him fair.I am Alexander MacIntosh, nephew to the LairdAnd I do disdain men who are vain, the men with powdered hair





	Powder Black and White

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Philomytha](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Philomytha/gifts).



> Why this wanted to be drabbles I cannot say, but it did. 
> 
> Many thanks to Philomytha for the fabulous prompt. 
> 
> Much gratitude to Eirenne for a very last minute sanity check, and to the usual suspects for invaluable help along the way.
> 
> The song can be found here on[YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FybKCSi7mU4).

Captain Hector Maxwell was not a sailor. He was an army captain, not navy. But he had sailed enough to appreciate the Nancy. She was small — a schooner, smaller than a frigate much less a ship-of-the-line. Her metier was shallow water, lakes and rivers, not deep ocean; speed and maneuverability more than strength and armament. That said, she carried remarkably able guns, cannon larger than one would expect of a ship her size and class. Nor were the crew behind-hand in their use. Maxwell had watched them drill, and there were vessels of far greater renown with men less able.

Timbers squeaked and groaned, the hull flexing minutely as it cut through the water under pressure of the wind in the sails. Below decks, the hiss of wind in the rigging was inaudible, only the occasional rattle of canvas reminding one of the ship’s superstructure. That and the running feet overhead, moving to shouted orders he could clearly hear, but make no sense of. (Of course a sailor would likely be in the same ignorance should he find himself in an infantry company with parade orders and maneuvers bellowed by sergeants. Efficient language, if one knew it, impenetrable if not.

A ship of parts and unexpected resources, the Nancy. Much like her captain, in more ways than one. Alexander MacIntosh reminded him of every vigorous boy come laughing off the school playing fields, sheened in sweat and confident in their strength and skill. Forthright in opinion, but willing to listen and seek advice — who of the other officers he had served under would ask for, and receive! good information from one of the native folk? None was the answer to that question. Sarah had chosen well, and now she and her children were safe away from all pursuit. Mission accomplished.

Hustled belowdeck before he could choose to leave the Nancy (not that he wanted to leave, but if his absence would help the schooner and her captain get away, then he would. If he could mislead or distract, so much the better) Maxwell found himself in the tiny rear cabin, waiting on events. His hands itched for his rifle (he had not been a rifleman since before being bought his captaincy in a line regiment, changing green coat for red), for some way he might assist the fight. Not his service, not his command. Only, he now knew, his heart.

"What shall we do with a drunken sailor?"  
The men (all nine of them) were singing as they pulled ropes and manned the guns. They were remarkably cheerful, Maxwell thought, for men likely to be captured with prejudice, since MacIntosh had not surrendered. But perhaps they were truly of the belief that they would win the day. They were none of them drunk, either — indeed they rarely were. Nothing he could do but stay out of their way, try to gage the battle from sound and motion and scent. At least they had good black powder, and plenty of shot.

* * *

"Powder is the mark of a fop, my boy. A fop or a lawyer or a creature of the court. Or a man of more money than sense. Do not be fooled, my lad. Do not be fooled by polish or fripperies or fashion. A fop may be a fool with his tongue and yet proficient with his hands; with blade or pen or pistol. Or hopeless with his hands and all too effective with his mouth. Don't be fooled, and keep account of your own hands and tongue. Keep your wits about you." Uncle Aneas was a wise man.

When he was ten Alexander MacIntosh fell into his great-uncle's powder room. He never entirely got over it. He was hiding from the incomprehensible running argument between the elegant, powdered, patched young men his uncle had warned him of. But they were fascinating as well. Though he certainly did not want them to catch him watching them! So into the library, then behind the table used as a desk, and plastered under the dusty wall-hanging. But the panelling gave under his slight weight, and into the closet he tumbled, disturbing years-old clouds of powder. And then the door swung shut.

His next older cousin had found him and gotten him out, valiant in his efforts not to laugh at the sight he had made. But soon all laughter had left them — the argument between the young men had taken a dreadful, exciting turn, and there was a duel to be fought, now, this morning (for it was morning, he'd been in the closet for hours) and Lachlan knew just where they could hide and watch. So powdered and scented and grubby, he had seen for the first time men firing guns at each other, though no one died that day.

He also saw, through the sharp smoke, two of the young men embrace in fierce and desperate relief, the same look on the one's face as he had seen on his father's, when his mother had been safely delivered of his littlest sister. A look that smote the heart. And from that day, hair-powder (indeed cosmetic powder of any kind) and gunpowder were linked in a tangle of feelings he had no words for, and less understanding. The knot remained in some deep chamber of his mind, rarely invoked, but there, waiting for circumstance to bring it back to light.

* * *

Maxwell had been standing close, arguing to be set ashore (as if that would do anything but get the man captured or killed, which, no, not on Alexander MacIntosh's watch, no indeed, no matter how foppish) close enough to breathe the faint warm scent of his hair-powder when the Americans fired a ranging shot. Eames in the rigging above fired back. Grey smoke stung his nose. Without thought, he'd ordered Maxwell below, out of harm's way. Never mind he was a soldier, could undoubtably fight and shoot with the best. He didn't need the distraction. Deal with him later. 

"Keep my wits about me," Alexander said to himself, a little desperately, as his men moved efficiently around him. "Make sure there is a later to deal." And Alexander MacIntosh, irrepressible, unwilling to accept defeat, taunted his enemies with words and roundshot, clever sailing and a crew he knew like brothers, a river he had piloted in every season, aware as never before of Maxwell below. Black powder and white, deception and truth, soldier's trim uniform and sailors practical slops. Not a contradiction. Only a battle to fight. A fight to win. The current should be … there. They were away.

"Your reputation precedes you, my dear Captain MacIntosh. By fitting Sarah and her children up as perfect, finicking little lordlings, in smart coats and dressed hair, you would not look at them closely, seeing only powder, not the people. And while I am certain you would not betray them, this way, you could deny any knowledge in perfect sincerity, should you be asked. As indeed you were, and as indeed you did." 

Powder as deception, only this time in good cause. Maxwell not married, obliged to wife and service, but serving as means to escape an intolerable situation, setting free.

* * *

He was dreaming, Alexander was. Bent over the chart table, breeches loose, coat-tails flipped up and out of the way — or was he even wearing a coat? It hardly mattered; this was after all only a dream — with Maxwell’s long hands gripping hard at his hips, and Maxwell’s long cock slick and hard between his thighs, cheeks, in the back door importunate and welcome. Or again, back against the mainmast, flies undone, Maxwell at his feet and that clever mouth doing clever, unspeakable things. Or the other way around, though Alexander wouldn't call his own mouth clever, his sturdy fingers graceful.

Hector was not dreaming, but savoring the weight of the man in his arms, relaxed and replete. The bed was wide, the covers dry, the comforter plump with feathers, as were the pillows. A fair and pleasant change from a cabin's narrow cot and rough woolen blankets. But he had fond memories of that cabin. They had put what privacy they had to good use then, and more space and comfort now did not diminish the value of what had been. Or the continuing surprise at the depth of his love, and that it was returned. Despite the foppish hair-powder.

* * *

Captains Alexander MacIntosh and Hector Maxwell stood on the quay at Moy in Windsor, across the river from the now American enclave of Detroit, looking up toward Lake St-Claire, the water vanishing in mist. The Nancy had served valiantly til the last, scuttled to prevent the Americans getting her stores, and her men had paddled amazingly far to safety. Not Alexander's men, nor any longer his command, but still, one did not hear such news unmoved. There would be other ships, should they wish. For now, they would enjoy each other's company, with no need of powder, black or white.

* * *


End file.
